Spotlights

July 29 2013

New Tech For Medical Meeting Planners

By David McMillin, Staff Writer

This week marks a big date in the world of medical meetings: August 1, 2013. That’s when data collection of all payments and other transfers of value to physicians and teaching hospitals officially begins. For anyone involved in medical meetings, those transfers of value represent causes for concern because they include booth giveaways on the show floor.

There are new tools built to calm those concerns. One of them is the Sunshine Reporter from California-based exhibit software company Interactica, and it’s designed to easily capture which attendees receive which items during a meeting or conference. The tool is an iPad application that collects data via badge swiping or manually entering information. Names, countries, license, NPI or DEA numbers and gifts are then automatically imported into an Excel spreadsheet.

For-profit organizations aren’t the only ones aiming to help the industry make reporting more efficient. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services also recently unveiled OPEN PAYMENTS, a new mobile application program that includes offerings for both manufacturers and physicians. While manufacturers are responsible for reporting information, the CMS app helps physicians track and review data to ensure its accuracy, too. It comes with a nice price tag, too: free.

Why You Need to Get Down With Data Collection

Show organizers and exhibiting companies have every reason to take data collection very seriously, too. Physicians are worried about the potential for mistakes in the process. According to a recent survey conducted by MMIS, Inc. and Healthcare Data Solutions, 21 percent of physicians would sever their relationships with manufacturers who reported inaccurate information, and 43 percent of physicians indicate that reporting errors would impact their ongoing relationships with the industry as a whole.

“Government, industry and physician organizations will need to increase communication in this new age of transparency, share data prior to public dissemination and provide a process for physicians and institutions to resolve disputes regarding incorrect or inaccurate information,” Michaeline Daboul, CEO, MMIS, said in a statement.

If you are still working to understand how the Sunshine Act could affect your meeting, your exhibitors and your attendees, click here to read thoughts from Johnnie White, PCMA Chairman of the Board and Executive Director, Center for Education Cardiovascular Research Foundation.